Chevron first entered China in 1904, when it began selling kerosene for lamps and home heating. In the 1920s, we opened service stations and sales outlets in major Chinese cities, and during the late 1930s, we began marketing petroleum products under the Caltex™ brand.
In 1979, Chevron was one of the first Western companies to reenter China. Chevron became a partner in one of China's first offshore oil production projects, in the Pearl River Mouth Basin of the South China Sea. Discovered in 1985, the Huizhou oil fields began production in 1990.
In 2007, the company signed a 30-year production-sharing contract with China National Petroleum Corporation for the joint development of the Chuandongbei natural gas field in central China.
Chevron participates as a one-sixth owner of the Australian North West Shelf Venture liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, which won the right to provide natural gas to China's first-ever LNG supply contract. In 2006, the Chevron-operated Northern Swan LNG carrier made the first North West Shelf deliveries to China's first LNG facility, in Guangdong province.
Through our joint venture Chevron Phillips Chemical Co LLC and its affiliates (CPChem), we built a $90 million polystyrene plant in Zhangjiagang City, Jiangsu province, in 2000. Polystyrene is used to make plastic dinnerware, CD cases, insulation and foam drink cups, among other things.
Development Programs
Chevron provides the local Chinese workforce with many learning and development opportunities. Courses cover subjects ranging from management and leadership training to communication skills and petroleum industry primers.
Chevron launched a career development program in 2008 in China. Ten positions were made available to university master's degree graduates in the first two years. As of early 2011, another five positions were expected to be offered to Chinese graduates with backgrounds in petroleum studies.
Chevron also extends development programs to our joint-venture partners. For example, new employees entering the CACT Operators Group are given hands-on training in order to work effectively and safely. We frequently use employee exchanges to share technology and skills with our Chinese partners. In 2009, 18 field operators from PetroChina received three months of training on how to work safely with advanced equipment that will be used in sour-gas production. The training was provided at Chevron's Employee Resource Training Center in Lafayette, Louisiana.
In 1985, Chevron began licensing our proprietary Vacuum Residue Desulfurization technology to Sinopec Qilu Petrochemicals in Shandong province. The technology is used to reduce sulfur content in fuel. This was followed by a hydroprocessing technology license to Sinopec Qilu. Chevron's hydroprocessing technology helps refiners improve the quality and increase the quantity of their base oil production.
Awards and Recognition
In August 2010, Chevron and our partners in Bohai Bay received two awards from the Chinese government. The National Auditing Agency recognized the joint venture for compliance with auditing, business ethics and anticorruption efforts. The second award was from the Chinese Environmental Protection Agency for replacing a crude-burning generator with a gas turbine generator. Gas that was previously flared generated power and saved more than 100 barrels of oil per day from being burned.
Several publications and their readers presented Caltex with many honors in 2010.
- Reader's Digest recognized Caltex stations for the best service for the 10th straight year.
- Hong Kong's Next Magazine gave Caltex the Top Service Award for the fourth year in a row.
- Sing Tao Daily News gave Caltex the Diamond Service Brand Award.
- Hong Kong's Car and Driver magazine honored Caltex with its Best Service Award.
The company was also recognized in 2010 by the Hong Kong Council of Social Service, a group comprising 370 nongovernmental organizations. For the fifth year running, Chevron received the Caring Company Award for our sponsorship of Project Chance, a program organized by the Boys and Girls Clubs Association of Hong Kong.
Updated: August 2011
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